The Tough But Hopeful Sheriff

Oct 1, 2002

Brazil's new securities regulator, Luiz Leonardo Cantidiano, intends to stamp out cheating and viligilantly monitor corporate reporting. But he also is playing the role as a promoter of the markets, convinced that they can be revived.

The president of Brazil's CVM Securities Commission is
commonly known simply as the Sheriff of the Markets, the
implication being that Latin America's biggest capital market
is little more than a Wild West. Luiz Leonardo Cantidiano, a
Rio de Janeiro securities lawyer, is Brazil's third Sheriff in
three years, taking office in August. But unlike his
predecessors, Cantidiano comes equipped with serious new powers
to stamp out cheating and enforce Brazil's tough new securities
laws. Cantidiano, 53, is a securities lawyer with 30 years'
experience but his most important attribute probably is a
deeply felt optimism that Brazil's capital markets can be
saved. He says, "There has been a series of negative factors:
inflation, recession, high deficits and poor corporate
governance. Stability, low inflation, low interest rates will
begin a process with people interested in coming to the market
and companies willing to sell shares to reverse the...